— The Academy Awards represent the annual celebration of the most formidable soft-power cultural force the world has ever known: Hollywood. If there's one thing that shouldn't be expected from Hollywood, it's depth — particularly of the political kind. What we can expect instead is pathetic pandering to the worst of emotivist "yay/boo" morality, masquerading as political insight. Consider the winner in the best documentary category, "Citizenfour," about former NSA contractor turned defector Edward Snowden. Although it's possible that the Academy's choice was made on the nonpolitical merits of the film, this is Hollywood...

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— The Academy Awards represent the annual celebration of the most formidable soft-power cultural force the world has ever known: Hollywood.
If there's one thing that shouldn't be expected from Hollywood, it's depth — particularly of the political kind....

The success of The Script’s song “Breakeven” in 2010 surprised just about everybody. It wasn’t even among the first two singles released from The Script’s self-titled 2008 album. The first single, “We Cry,” failed to chart in the U.S. The ...

Over the last couple of months, several people have forwarded me the following e-mail. It’s liberally dotted with terrible flood photos to illustrate the havoc, a few of which I’ll reproduce here. Two standards? After Katrina, the media blamed the ...

Kate Pierson of the B-52s fell so hard for her first Airstream that she ended up owning enough of the travel trailers to open an all-Airstream hotel in the desert near Joshua Tree National Park.
Fans of the retro-chic silver bullets spend $200 a night to...

"Insurgent," the second part of the "Divergent" film series, kicked off its box office run with a healthy $4.1 million in ticket sales from late night showings Thursday.
That came up short of the $4.9 million the first...

The biggest contribution that star, producer and part screenwriter Sean Penn adds to the perplexing political action movie "The Gunman" is his guns. It's not how the film reflects Penn's commitment to international activism as it chases...

Logic would dictate that production of an action movie would start with the high-intensity physical elements. Director Pierre Morel doesn't follow such logic. "When I make an action movie, I start with the connection between the characters,"...

Charlotte Gainsbourg has always had a flinch in her acting, a twitch that suggests she's bracing for that next blow physical or psychological. It made her the perfect Jane Eyre, perfect as Sean Penn's I-know-he'll-leave-me wife in "21...

"Don't do anything stupid," the old CIA pal (Ray Winstone) growls to his retired "Company" assassin friend. Since we've seen this killer's blackouts and dizzy spells, viewed his X-rays and heard a doctor tell him to avoid any...

Opening Friday The Divergent Series: Insurgent (PG-13): The second installment in the film franchise based on Veronica Roth's best-selling young adult novels pits our heroine Tris (Shailene Woodley) against increasingly powerful enemies. Miles Teller,...

Sean Penn opened up about the green card joke heard 'round the world on Saturday in Beverly Hills during a promotional tour for his new film "The Gunman," saying that he has "absolutely no apologies" for his comment. The actor-director...

"I'VE switched over to watching 'My 600-lb Life!'"
That's an e-mail I received at the almost half-way point of Sunday night's (as usual) interminable Oscar telecast.
WHAT IS there to legitimately critique every year, when a whole lot of...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Costumes, gowns and jewelry worn by Madonna in films such as "Evita" and "A League of Their Own" and in the "Material Girl" music video will be the highlights of a celebrity auction next month in...

"WHEN HISTORY rolls on to blacken her name with accusations of poison, incest and prostitution, it helps to remember that Lucrezia Borgia was barely 13 years old when her father's elevation to pope threw her into the public spotlight."
So...

Breaking news: Jay Z and Beyonce got into a violent altercation with others that was captured on a noir-ish film.
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Pamela Anderson has revealed a history of sexual assault, ticking off instances of molestation, rape and gang rape. Her revelations occurred at a charity event held on a luxury yacht at the Cannes Film Festival.
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"ADVERSITY MAKES men, and prosperity makes monsters," said Victor Hugo. Well, in Hollywood, monsters make prosperity!
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"PASSIONATE LOVE, I take it, rarely lasts long and is very troublesome while it does last. Mutual esteem is much more valuable," said Anthony Trollope.
For a man with a name like Trollope, he was certainly a killjoy!
USUALLY I let my gifted...